Sep 4 2006
Jeremy Schoemaker

My Top 10 Worst Ideas To Make Money

By Jeremy Schoemaker 228 comments »

I think I am about 5 for 500 when it comes to successful ideas vs flops. I just watched a documentary about my neighbor Warren Buffett and he talked about how you should brag about your failures and be humble about your successes. I think my new years resolution in 2007 is to be way more humble. Do not think I have some golden touch or something that everything works out great… its just the law of averages.. try enough stuff and something will stick.

Anyway I came up (in about 10 minutes) my top 10 worst ideas to make money that totally were a waste of time and effort (and money in some cases).

And also BTW you cant read this post if you know me in real life and k thx…

  • 10 - FireFox Forum (firefoxforum.com) - I purchased this site on digitalpoint ($800) after getting some inside information that FireFox was going to team up with Google on a per download affiliate program. Well all that happened and I think I made about 50$ the first year. FLOP

  • 9 - BabyCalc.com - If you were about to have a baby you could go on this site and punch in some numbers then it would email you as your baby was growing and let you know what was going on… “like 10 days until you should be able to tell the sex of your baby!” or “Babys heart beat starts today” ect.. stuff like that.. I paid to have the backend developed and the site was about 95% completed (about a 1500$ investment).

    Then a very close friend of the family had a miscarriage about 15 weeks into her pregnancy and told us about how she had signed up for all these baby websites and now they keep emailing her stuff and she breaks down and cries every time…. I just wanted no part of that… FLOP

  • 8 - Pimp My Blog - I thought this was going to be teh win. I mean… you want to pimp out your blog right ? I registered pimpmyblog.org but it was burning my ass that someone owned pimpmyblog.com. I hate making a site when I do not own the .com. Sure you can do good without owning the .com but they are always going to mooch off of your hard work…. so I HAD to own it and after about 3 weeks of haggling with this guy I paid $2,000.00 for the domain.
    I made a forum with Vbulletin and had big plans to implement wordpress templates and all kinds of cool blogging tools but just never got around to it =p. FLOP

  • 7 - Omaha-Used-Cars.com - Now here we go! This is easy. Just make a used car site and charge dealers a .25cent per car listing fee right ? ehhh none interested… FLOP

  • 6 - SMS Text Dating textdating.com/texting.com - I was soooooooo sure this one was going to be it! The concept is simple basically you subscribe to this dating website. Make a profile then you could send a message to the person from the website to there mobile phone without having to know there phone number. I had this totally done and nobody every signed up… FLOP

  • 5 - St. Marry’s Bar & Grill - Ok this has nothing to do with the internet. After the Hooters closed down in Lincoln I tried to re-open it then when that did not work out I thought about making a restaurant called St. Marrys where it was like a church and the waitresses dressed like catholic school girls and like the nuns would be the managers and spank the waitresses if they were bad?!? Yes I know bad idea and I never really pursued it…. I like in one of the most conservative catholic communities in the country so no way it would fly… and yes i know im going straight to hell.

  • 4 - 2 Topless Chix In A Ferrari Cross Country

    What would get more looks then a brand new ferrari f430 ? what if 2 topless girls were driving it cross country ? what if you could buy advertising on the car ? seemed like a good idea… then it did not.

  • 3 - Ads Or Not

    Simple concept. There is 5 ads on a webpage only one of them is NOT REALLY A AD! Each time you successfully spot the fake ad you get some money built up into your account. - I had issues finding advertisers who were down for this =P FLOP

  • 2 - ShoeMoney SEO Contest

    I thought it would be fun contest to see if someone could outrank me for shoemoney. Id like to not relive that.

  • 1 - ShoeMoney Petroleum Company -

    (I cant believe im actually telling these in public)

    Ok Follow me here -
    I want to purchase a Gas Station and Give away Free Gas

    The catch is like the gas would come out really slow and also you would be limited as to how much you could get per week. (Like max 50 gallons a week).

    How do I make money ? EASY - I would setup paintball guns around the gas station with webcams that would let people from the internet take shots at the people filling up there cars with gas. You could charge per shot or a xxxx amounts of shots per month for a set fee. PROBLEM - I talked to a city council member about this and he told me there was a “no flying ordinance” or something rule within city limits however I could maybe do it in the country…

Anyway….. thats all for now.

  1. shoelover said on September 4th, 2006 at 4:24 pm

    Number 1 may be one of the funniest business ideas I have heard in a long long time.
    xoxo
    Shoelover

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  2. Chris said on September 4th, 2006 at 4:26 pm

    That last one was a fricken excelent idea!! I would have paid for that.

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  3. feralcat said on September 4th, 2006 at 4:44 pm

    Laughing out loud at the Shoemoney Petroleum Company idea! I hope somebody does it.

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  4. Tom said on September 4th, 2006 at 5:09 pm

    The petroleum company had me nearly wetting my pants laughing so hard. What a great warped idea.

    The other weakness though is the trial lawyers. Can you imagine the disclaimer that you would have to have before anyone could enter the “fueling arena”"?

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  5. Tom said on September 4th, 2006 at 5:10 pm

    oops change #10 to #1 my bad

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  6. peter said on September 4th, 2006 at 5:42 pm

    the gas station is soooo cool lol!
    i bet this could be one very succesfull thingy, not for long but to make a nice amount of money, but needs good planning with tv camera teams and stuff.

    Or maybe people must get their gas naked? ^^

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  7. kid disco said on September 4th, 2006 at 5:55 pm

    Hey Shoe! Very courageous post! Some of those are freakin’ hilarious… but I think a couple are actually pretty valid ideas that may have just needed a bit of an extra marketing push…

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  8. garrett said on September 4th, 2006 at 6:06 pm

    Goood to see that you had alot of flops too. I thought the cell sms dating thing would be a good idea. They have a couple azoogle offers that do pretty well doing this.Cell Flirt and some new Playboy cell dating thing. But the gas station paintball thing would be the best , i would love to sign up on a website and shoot paintballs at people. I think you need to give that one another shot

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  9. Bulbboy said on September 4th, 2006 at 7:14 pm

    Stick with Nun restaurant, it could be a goer =P

    and PimpMyBlog ain’t dead yet. You could revive it yet.

    Not so sure about the Petrol Paintball though, possiblities for disaster are many and varied. In the words of Wayne’s world : Ka-boom!

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  10. Dr G said on September 4th, 2006 at 7:32 pm

    I got some southerners, to be politically correct, looking into the Petroleum company idea. That stuff will work for at least a quarter or two.
    Take care Shoe!

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  11. Dan said on September 4th, 2006 at 7:52 pm

    ShoeMoney Petroleum Company.. pure genius :D

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  12. Dan said on September 4th, 2006 at 7:53 pm

    #1 is genius

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  13. Don Chavez said on September 4th, 2006 at 8:18 pm

    The gas station idea is priceless. I keep picturing housewives walking through their front door covered with paint.

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  14. Caydel said on September 4th, 2006 at 9:48 pm

    Please Shoe - bring on the gas station. I would love paying to peg random people with paintballs via a webcam….

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  15. Ian Anderson said on September 4th, 2006 at 9:56 pm

    Great post shoe. People need to know that the vast majority of businesses fail, and that the failure of a business does not mean that you are a failure. If you keep trying, eventually you’ll find something that works.

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  16. dillsmack said on September 4th, 2006 at 10:16 pm

    Dude the Ferrari thing was totally my bad idea!

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  17. ShoeMoney said on September 4th, 2006 at 10:30 pm

    ok the ferrari thing was your idea but the topless chix was me

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  18. Tuppy Glossop said on September 4th, 2006 at 11:08 pm

    yes i know im going straight to hell
    No … first you’re being spanked by a nun. Then you’re going straight to hell!

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  19. Quadszilla said on September 4th, 2006 at 11:49 pm

    SHOEMONEYPETROLEUMCOMPANY.COM is available!

    Man, if I had 8 bucks I would snatch that in a heartbeat. Too bad my credit cards just got hit again for my monthly subscriptions to foot fetish sites. . .

    My worst idea for making money? “Investing” in baseball cards when I was 8. :(

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  20. Mike Seiler said on September 5th, 2006 at 12:05 am

    Do you think part of the problem with #10 was that most people going to the forum already had Firefox?

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  21. mrrbobs_free_dating said on September 5th, 2006 at 12:32 am

    thnx for posting these. what a hoot. The gas station thing would be too cool. But that should be done in southern California I think.

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  22. Stevie12 said on September 5th, 2006 at 12:42 am

    Nice post,

    Worse ideas have worked.

    I’d be willing to pay to see the topless chicks in the ferrari :p

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  23. Stevie12 said on September 5th, 2006 at 12:44 am

    ahh also,

    you’ve told us your worst now we want to know your most successfull.

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  24. pascal said on September 5th, 2006 at 1:44 am

    Hi Jeremy,

    thank you for your great post. After meeting you in San Jose it is still impressing to me how open you tell your ups and downs.

    Keep on rocking!
    Pascal (without metal cards)

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  25. Miha said on September 5th, 2006 at 2:06 am

    Try to imagine the topless chix in a Ferrari purchasing gas on ShoeMoney Gas Station… ;-)

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  26. Miha said on September 5th, 2006 at 3:22 am

    Try to imagine the topless chicx in a Ferrari on ShoeMoney Gas Station… wow!

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  27. Hone Watson said on September 5th, 2006 at 4:53 am

    Pimp my blog totally rocks! Except the badge no longer works.

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  28. Jawinn said on September 5th, 2006 at 5:18 am

    Wow its good to hear that you’ve had flops. It’s too easy in the celebrity worship culture we have to only focus on the results of hard work and not the work itself (and the failures that go with it).

    Thanks Shoe!

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  29. yfs1 said on September 5th, 2006 at 7:33 am

    You could vary #1 depending on station so although the Shoemoney Paintball Petroleum Station would be your flagship you could open a few new ones:

    Shoemoney Russian Roulete Petroleum Station - You either get free gas or free sugar, you just won’t know until you get a few miles down the road

    Shoemoney Penny Over Petroleum Station - You have to put in even amounts like $10 - If you accidentaly do a $10.01 the flame thrower is engaged

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  30. numlock said on September 5th, 2006 at 7:47 am

    haha!

    The gas station is so completely out there that it just has to work, even on the publicity it would generate alone..

    As for the other sites, after doing the same for the last couple of years I’ve come to realize that the idea and design doesn’t really matter much. If you don’t get blogged about by the right people, or if you’re not in the San Francisco “in-group” then the chances are you’ll just get drowned out by all the other noise :-(

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  31. enkumber said on September 5th, 2006 at 8:10 am

    Damn ! THIS IS A GREAT IDEA !

    If i would have money for this i would start it right away as i cannot see any problem making this business in Romania here.
    Hey Shoe, maybe you wanna invest in Romania ? I think you will not have enough gas :)

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  32. enkumber said on September 5th, 2006 at 8:27 am

    WOW ! THIS IS A GREAT IDEA !

    If i would have money for this i would start it right away as i cannot see any problem making this business in Romania here.
    Hey Shoe, maybe you wanna invest in Romania ? I think you will not have enough gas :)

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  33. Michael Martine said on September 5th, 2006 at 9:26 am

    I think you missed your calling as a reality tv show producer.

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  34. Lurkster said on September 5th, 2006 at 9:35 am

    Shoe, those are innovative. I like your thinking. The Gas station would be a blast, literally. I’m sure there is some poor neglected gas station in the middle of nowhere waiting to be the next “Field of Dreams� location…LOL

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  35. Patrick said on September 5th, 2006 at 11:04 am

    Dude those are some sweet ideas. Actually, what people need to realize is that you can launch 20 good ideas and only have 1 gain enough momentum to make decent cash. Its all about throwing a ton of ideas against the wall to see what will stick…

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  36. Thomas Czasz said on September 5th, 2006 at 11:07 am

    Wohh, your a neighbour with Warren Buffet????

    anyways the last idea was great, but I dunno about the paintballs shooting in a high concentration gasoline area.. And also the people would need to wear masks or something

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  37. ShoeMoney said on September 5th, 2006 at 11:19 am

    actually warren lives in omaha and I used to live about 10 blocks from him… close enough =P

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  38. ShoeMoney said on September 5th, 2006 at 11:20 am

    hahaha nice one

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  39. Ron Wilson said on September 5th, 2006 at 1:10 pm

    What are your best ideas?

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  40. Joe said on September 5th, 2006 at 1:53 pm

    Does he read your blog?

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  41. Mr. Unconventional said on September 5th, 2006 at 2:46 pm

    Woo boy Shoe, I almost spit my drink out when I got to your petroleum company idea. That’s too funny. What’s even funnier is knowing how popular that would be.

    It reminds me of those remote control hunting sites. Ever see those? Yilkes!

    On a more serious note - posts like this show that behind most success there’s a large trail of ______ fill in the blank. ;) I don’t even want to go there… lol

    - Dave

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  42. Convert said on September 5th, 2006 at 4:32 pm

    I used to hate you, just because I was jealous of your money making schemes, but all that has changed after reading this post. You’re not a superhuman, who could’ve believe that. This post has just bought you a new reader. Thanks for the laughs Jeremy! :)

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  43. Igor M. (BizMord Blog) said on September 6th, 2006 at 7:14 am

    Jeremy, first of all … it’s entertaining as well as educational to read a post like this one.

    I think that if everyone would share their flops, business man and women would benefit 50X more than if they’d go to every seminar and read every book on marketing.

    Here is an idea …. BusinessFlops.
    oops … already registered that one.

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  44. SeoRookie said on September 6th, 2006 at 10:22 am

    The Petroleum Company is a hoot but I’m sure there are regulations about discharging projectiles around gas pumps. Just a hunch.

    A better idea is to offer free bikini car washes and let people take shots at the girls.

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  45. Everett said on September 6th, 2006 at 10:45 am

    I’m glad I am not the only one to have major flops. Misery loves company and http://www.promotiontrader.com was certainly a miserable flop (yes, it’s being redirected now).

    The idea was that people could join and post service trades like “ISAPI expert will write regular expressions for your website in exchange for a custom site design from a creative website designer” etcetera. But I got more attempted link spam than actual posts. The problem was I didn’t have the time - at the time - to really give the project the push it needed.

    Lesson: Unless you are willing to commit on a project, don’t bother. There are too many websites out there for you to half-ass it and expect to succeed.

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  46. Ben Yoskovitz said on September 6th, 2006 at 11:30 am

    Kudos for telling us about your flops. Actually, the 2nd most popular post on my blog was about my Top 4 Failures as an Entrepreneur.

    People love reading about other people failing. It’s the same like watching a celebrity crash and burn, or reality TV.

    Nice job putting it out there.

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  47. kevin said on September 6th, 2006 at 1:57 pm

    man, i really like the paintball idea. I could probably get away with that in a hick town in Florida. Funny stuff.

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  48. fthead9 said on September 6th, 2006 at 3:46 pm

    Brilliant post, seriously made my day. Someone in Vegas has to run with your Catholic schoolgirl/restaurant idea.

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  49. Rich Whittle said on September 6th, 2006 at 6:57 pm

    Hey Shoe, I don’t know if you will read the 57th comment, but I think some of your ideas are good, just need a little tweaking!

    * 9 - BabyCalc.com - If you were about to have a baby you could go on this site and punch in some numbers then it would email you as your baby was growing and let you know what was going on… “like 10 days until you should be able to tell the sex of your baby!� or “Babys heart beat starts today� ect.. stuff like that.. I paid to have the backend developed and the site was about 95% completed (about a 1500$ investment).
    Then a very close friend of the family had a miscarriage about 15 weeks into her pregnancy and told us about how she had signed up for all these baby websites and now they keep emailing her stuff and she breaks down and cries every time…. I just wanted no part of that… FLOP

    *******Sounds like a great idea…..here’s a fix. Everytime the babycalc would send an email, it would require that the end user do something like confirm that they received the email by clicking on a link in the email or a visit to the website for articles related to the fetus development at that stage. If there was no interaction by the end user
    after 1 or 2 emails, the account would be frozen and would require a visit to the web site to restore.

    * 7 - Omaha-Used-Cars.com - Now here we go! This is easy. Just make a used car site and charge dealers a .25cent per car listing fee right ? ehhh none interested… FLOP

    ******Problem with this idea is that anyone can build this web site. To convince dealers to pay to list you would have to have a lot of traffic already coming to the web site. Something that would take time to build.

    * 6 - SMS Text Dating textdating.com/texting.com - I was soooooooo sure this one was going to be it! The concept is simple basically you subscribe to this dating website. Make a profile then you could send a message to the person from the website to there mobile phone without having to know there phone number. I had this totally done and nobody every signed up… FLOP

    *****This sounds like a great concept. How long did you try it? Also, marketing is a big key. You would need to come up with some sort of viral message to generate word of mouth. Now with Youtube, you could create a video showing a guy and gal using the service, but make it funny.

    * 5 - St. Marry’s Bar & Grill - Ok this has nothing to do with the internet. After the Hooters closed down in Lincoln I tried to re-open it then when that did not work out I thought about making a restaurant called St. Marrys where it was like a church and the waitresses dressed like catholic school girls and like the nuns would be the managers and spank the waitresses if they were bad?!? Yes I know bad idea and I never really pursued it…. I like in one of the most conservative catholic communities in the country so no way it would fly… and yes i know im going straight to hell.

    ***How about a little modification of the original concept? Instead of bar and grill, make it an upscale mens club.
    The waitresses/dancers would be dressed like catholic school girls and for a fee, men visitors could “buy” a yardstick ruler and smack the dancers. Make money from cover, rulers and liquor! When local churches complain
    and try to shut you down, free publicity and more people want to come!

    * 4 - 2 Topless Chix In A Ferrari Cross Country
    What would get more looks then a brand new ferrari f430 ? what if 2 topless girls were driving it cross country ? what if you could buy advertising on the car ? seemed like a good idea… then it did not.

    ***How about a little modification of the original concept? Put webcams all over the car and hook it up using wifi that would broadcast video “live” from car to your SUBSCRIPTION web site. Still put ads on car, but more money would be made from web site with Google maps showing where the car and the girls were. People would stand on side of road with cardboard signs (Like OJ Simpson Bronco “chase”).

    * 1 - ShoeMoney Petroleum Company -
    Ok Follow me here -
    I want to purchase a Gas Station and Give away Free Gas
    The catch is like the gas would come out really slow and also you would be limited as to how much you could get per week. (Like max 50 gallons a week).
    How do I make money ? EASY - I would setup paintball guns around the gas station with webcams that would let people from the internet take shots at the people filling up there cars with gas. You could charge per shot or a xxxx amounts of shots per month for a set fee. PROBLEM - I talked to a city council member about this and he told me there was a “no flying ordinance� or something rule within city limits however I could maybe do it in the country…

    ***How about a little modification of the original idea? Still giving away FREE gas. Go to a gas station and work out a deal with the owner. Offer to allow him to give away free gas in exchange for putting advertising signs at the pumps advertising your sponsor. Then using the gas pump software, develop software that would randomly choose someone pumping gas that would receive a FREE $50 gas card. Gas station owner wins with more business, you win with selling advertising to your sponsors and drivers win with free gas.

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  50. Mike Dammann said on September 6th, 2006 at 8:48 pm

    I could have told you about PimpMyBlog, but hey … you didn’t ask me ;)

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  51. Wealthy Webmaster said on September 7th, 2006 at 2:07 am

    Haha I’m glad I wasn’t drinking anything when I read that gas station part. I’d take the f430, naked chicks inside or not! That’s my favorite car at the moment. :P Now where did I put that extra 250g’s?

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  52. Farmer77 said on September 7th, 2006 at 11:34 pm

    Shoe, can you post your 10 best ideas that worked? Okay, maybe not your best 10, since there would be some stuff you would want to keep for yourself. Maybe your best 11-20 ideas?

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  53. Dabbling Mum said on September 8th, 2006 at 10:16 pm

    I love it! You have great strength of character to be willing to share so many flops and in such a humorous and light-hearted way!

    I’m with Farmer77….I’d love to read about some of your “great ideas” that were not flops and why you feel they were not flops.

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  54. Pete said on September 9th, 2006 at 5:16 pm

    Somebody’s got to make the gas station site. I mean just think of traffic you could get with a idea as crazy as that.

    I think the pimpmyblog -idea was rather good. Instead of giving tools to create a blog I think they should do like the so. They would select weekly a blog and hire a professional web designer and some blogosphere guru and direct the site with huge amounts of traffic. I would visit the site weekly to see new pimped sites.

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  55. Connoisseur said on September 10th, 2006 at 4:06 am

    Your efforts on the SMS text msg dating concept have sparked my imagination. I have an alternative use that may revitalize your idea, lets chat…

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  56. Brian said on September 22nd, 2006 at 6:13 am

    great read, well worth my time =] thank you for sharing.

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  57. Ashley said on October 4th, 2006 at 1:49 pm

    I love the gas station idea, but I see why it would never work.

    But what about the same idea with the slow pumps and all, except show commercials to the customers as they’re standing there. I’d definately watch commercials for free gas.

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  58. Directory said on December 31st, 2006 at 10:52 am

    Nice for posting here so we would keep in mind not to follow up on them.

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  59. Vik Dulat - Making Money the Easy Way said on October 28th, 2007 at 6:19 pm

    I love these flops shoemoney. I have couple of them I will shortly in my blog..Keep up the great work!

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  60. Harrisburg Web Design said on November 1st, 2007 at 1:42 pm

    I can’t believe I didn’t see this post before. That gasoline idea is one of the funniest things I’ve ever read online. Brilliant!

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  61. Catherine L said on November 1st, 2007 at 5:02 pm

    LOL - the diner with nuns is hilarious. As is the gas station one.

    Seriously though - everyone has shit ideas. I reckon if you can find one good one in a hundred you’re laughing.

    One of my worst ones was trying to rent out fans to offices in the summer when we had a heatwave. By the time I’d got the flyers made and delivered the sunshine had gone - it only lasted about three or four days. We just don’t have much luck with weather over here in the uk.

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  62. 1000 Dollar Project said on November 2nd, 2007 at 7:44 am

    lol we all have our sites we look back on and shed a tear for, but they made us what we are today. remembering the quality of my first website makes me cringe on how good i thought it was, but without it i wouldnt be as good as i am today (in my opinion lol)

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  63. serge said on November 2nd, 2007 at 9:32 am

    those are the kind of ideas that one has when laying in bed late at night. the next morning you wake up and think about it more… eventually the fire burns out when you realize it won’t work.

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  64. Stream Clips said on November 4th, 2007 at 12:39 am

    Thanks for sharing. It gives me hope to see that you finally found a niche that worked for you. Perhaps mine is coming soon.

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  65. Stream Clips said on November 4th, 2007 at 1:58 am

    Thanks for sharing. It gives me hope that I will find my niche as well .

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  66. louise said on November 4th, 2007 at 5:00 am

    Oh wow, not often i cry lauging at a blog but I love this post! The gaosline idea just kills me! Maybe put the garage next to the nuns diner…

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  67. Hustle Strategy said on November 4th, 2007 at 10:09 am

    I am still laughing at the SEO contest. That is great…

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  68. Christopher Stigson said on November 4th, 2007 at 10:13 am

    HAHAHAHHAHHAHHHAHAHAHAHAHA!

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  69. Domtan said on November 5th, 2007 at 7:59 am

    ShoeMoney Petroleum Company has to be the funniest idea encountered. Hilarious. But you could have made something out of the Text Dating idea. Sounds valid.

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  70. Joeychgo said on November 8th, 2007 at 12:00 pm

    were you really dieting heavy when you came up with the ShoeMoney Petroleum Company? LOL — Well, none of us are perfect.

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  71. Tony Smith said on November 8th, 2007 at 2:53 pm

    Funny post! It gives the rest of us hope that we need to just keep trying new things.

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  72. Deborah Dera said on November 8th, 2007 at 3:49 pm

    #1 was great! I think you may have had insurance issues, though. No one would have given you coverage knowing all the people buying gas would sue you for new paint jobs after being hit!

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  73. BloggerDollar said on November 9th, 2007 at 12:53 am

    Some crazy ideas, I beleive catholic school girls would make you a lot of money :)

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  74. Samantha said on November 9th, 2007 at 11:22 am

    The gas station idea is great, it would definitely work and be sure to generate tons of publicity.

    Your text dating idea should have worked, but perhaps it was not marketed correctly.

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  75. The Property Pundit said on November 10th, 2007 at 4:29 pm

    Haha- very nice

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  76. John said on November 10th, 2007 at 5:43 pm

    Great Post! It is nice to have someone talking about some of the failures they have experienced, along with the success. People always want to give up completely everytime they experience a failure. The truth is, you may fail 1000 times, but it only takes one time of being right to be a millionaire

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  77. Interwebhunt said on November 12th, 2007 at 9:03 am

    The gas station idea is by far the best idea i’ve ever heard for use of webcams in conjunction with paintball guns. I would completely buy into that project.

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  78. Kay Kastum said on November 12th, 2007 at 8:46 pm

    I found out about you in sabahan.com
    Well crazy people get crazy results right? Not to mention the crazy income :D

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  79. JoeTech.com said on November 13th, 2007 at 6:10 pm

    These are effing great! #1 is awesome and in regards to #5, that would go over nicely in Phoenix. http://www.thelibraryusa.com The library is doing well (as far as I can tell), and I’d be at St. Mary’s all the time. Maybe I should post a list of my top 10 failure ideas, like when I decided to host a free image hosting site on GoDaddy hosting and GoDaddy didn’t enforce their bandwidth limit with a cap. Traffic was great, but the site came down when I saw the $2,700 hosting bill.

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  80. Dan said on November 14th, 2007 at 12:18 am

    The #1 is a great idea. Should try it in some country with less red tape :) I can imagine this totally happening on one of those supercrazy japanese gameshows / hidden cameras.

    Kudos for pointing out your failures! I must also state that I really admire your persistence to keep going and trying. After all, it can now be clearly seen it paid off huh? Great inspiration, thanks

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  81. Girish a.k.a KiHack said on November 14th, 2007 at 6:04 am

    What happened with the SEO contest?

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  82. TIBET ARTS said on November 14th, 2007 at 7:06 am

    That’s good Idea At Last .
    hummm.

    Any way There are many FLOP story Behind every succesful Person .
    Best of luck

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  83. Matthew said on November 14th, 2007 at 2:10 pm

    ShoeMoney Petroleum Company - LOL if you ever figure out how to legally do this I want to invest…

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  84. SEO Vibe said on November 15th, 2007 at 6:07 am

    #4 - topless anything has been done to death, not that anyone is complaining!

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  85. Tevin said on November 17th, 2007 at 2:13 am

    No kidding. I’m pretty much rolling on the floor.

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  86. Tim said on November 18th, 2007 at 9:50 pm

    The babyCalc and petroleum is very GOOD idea…Keep it up!

    –blog for dream–

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  87. fbics said on November 19th, 2007 at 11:57 am

    nice ns ns…

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  88. Syd said on November 20th, 2007 at 12:38 am

    Everyone has their share of failures and mistakes. As it is said that success was never achieved without failure (maybe just a lucky few might have escaped this failure path). The important thing is not to give up when you fail and still go on. That is the test of character and strength.

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  89. Rich Sage said on November 20th, 2007 at 8:09 am

    Do you need Investors for the paintball gas station idea? Please get in tough!!! Ha… Can’t believe you got around to this. The wrong spark and there goes everything.

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  90. SEOidiot said on November 20th, 2007 at 9:38 am

    The more bad ideas you have the better your chances of a good one

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  91. William Montanaro said on November 20th, 2007 at 4:18 pm

    I agree with the thing about the forum, i ended up paying way over the odds for one cause I thought I could market it properly, but it turns out I can’t and there isn’t any money in it…

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  92. Keith Cash said on November 21st, 2007 at 12:13 am

    I am MAD. You stole all my best Ideas. :)

    Cheers

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  93. William said on November 23rd, 2007 at 5:55 pm

    Oh man, I laughed my ass off at #1. Not because it was a bad idea, but because I pictured it in my mind and thought that I’d like to see gas stations like that.

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  94. Israel said on November 23rd, 2007 at 11:35 pm

    haha, i liked it a lot. sounds like a sick reality show.

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  95. Israel said on November 23rd, 2007 at 11:36 pm

    u sure about that? sometimes it discourages you into not coming up with anything.

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  96. sexyMG said on November 24th, 2007 at 5:06 am

    Make a gas station and try to low the prizes of galons, i will come there every day then :D

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  97. TvForPc said on November 28th, 2007 at 12:14 pm

    Some great ideas actually, but you got enough money that it really wont affect you too much… lucky man!

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  98. Jason Brailow said on November 28th, 2007 at 7:10 pm

    Some of your ideas may have taken off with follow though, but your rich, who cares!!

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  99. pachecus said on November 28th, 2007 at 8:14 pm

    LOL your Shoemoney Petroleum Company idea is the best one!

    hey shoe… what about new ideas?

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  100. Wezod.com said on November 30th, 2007 at 8:23 pm

    Number 1 is great… It could definitely be done outside city limits. I could think of a couple different ideas with this business model. lol

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  101. Neotrepreneur said on December 1st, 2007 at 4:16 pm

    SOme humm interesting ideas lol. Im just wondering how did you come up with all that?

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  102. Christine said on December 4th, 2007 at 10:10 am

    I would pay to shoot paintballs at people filling up with free gas! You can sell them full body plastic covers too. Woohoo! Please open it!

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  103. Smart websites make money said on December 5th, 2007 at 7:55 am

    Well, and I have a friend coming up with what I thought to be the most stupid ideas :-) Anyway, I like the one with the gas station. And the one with the ferrari, of course

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  104. Ricardo said on December 9th, 2007 at 5:09 am

    “paintball guns shooting at the people getting their gas! ”
    Now I’ve heard it all! :p

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  105. Ricardo said on December 9th, 2007 at 5:10 am

    “paintball guns shooting at the people getting their gas! ”
    Now I’ve heard it all!

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  106. Margaret said on December 10th, 2007 at 12:37 pm

    It’s really funny, but your worst idea regarding the car — well, check out THIS post … by the way this is not my site, but a post I came across earlier today :)

    Margaret

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  107. Dave L said on December 11th, 2007 at 8:37 pm

    Common problem with ideas—they are actually more like seeds, but most people treat them like trees. You need to start with an idea, develop it, combine it with other ideas, get at what’s right and wrong in the principle behind the idea, develop the principle, etc.

    But most people just take an idea and run with it. Rich Whittle has the right start, but need to go even further. Keep an idea diary and expand ideas over time for months.

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  108. newMediaMike said on December 12th, 2007 at 12:09 pm

    Why did #7 fail? Was it a flat $0.25 per vehicle per day? week? I ask because I’m in the process of launching http://wheelsmart.tv - kind of like a cross between youtube and autotrader where people can advertise their own vehicles for sale using videos they shoot and post on youtube, but I want to charge dealers for professionally produced videos. I was going to keep the rate at the same as the local autotrader rags.

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  109. Empowering Success said on December 13th, 2007 at 11:10 am

    What a laugh fest! I loved them all, but agree, a couple really could make some money with the right marketing! I have actually had quite a few ideas, luckily my wife is good at making sure I don’t throw away any money on something I haven’t fully thought through.
    Actually I recently came up with an EXcellent idea, and I am sure it would go over great, but then again….

    Ron Killian

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  110. David Melamed said on December 14th, 2007 at 11:14 am

    LOL.
    Worst Idea for me was probably my reality tv show idea, “Two Babies, One Bottle.” You ever seen two under two kids one at home and the other is a guest. when the guest starts playing with a toy, the hosting baby usually gets pissed, and they can be quite vicious… I even pitched it to Steve Spira, the executive vp of global biz affairs of warner bros. whose words about it were, “Dude, you are twisted!” and than explained no one wants to watch a show with babies crying…

    My best idea ever, “Bikini Realty, motto: Actions between consenting adults is not the responsibility of Bikini Realty.

    It’s simply brilliant, Sex Sells, so why not let Sex sell houses ?! We have hot chicks in bikinis as our realtors doing apt. rentals for college dudes, and condo sales for rich bachelors and such….

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  111. Daniel Peeden said on December 14th, 2007 at 1:49 pm

    My Twin and I, come up with innovative ideas all of the time, at least we think they are. We are young entrepenuers that are getting our feet wet in th internet industry. Trigeia.com is our first site and i think the initial start up weve spent is about $30,000 and it isnt even live yet, Hopefully this works. But then i think to my self isnt anything possible even if you think it might be the dumbest idea on planet earth. They say “Persistance make the impossible, possible. The Possible, likely and the likely, definate.” I guess you just have to keep moving forward.

    Twin

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  112. Justin Dupre said on December 15th, 2007 at 2:55 pm

    God hahaha…

    I feel like I am going through these same motions. Never being able to get the idea right and unable to build up the traffic that wants my services. Blah

    Just gotta keep trying till I get it right I guess.

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  113. Affiliate Marketing Podcast said on December 16th, 2007 at 3:24 am

    Haha, love #1 - it’s nice to see that even the big guys still make human mistakes.

    ~ Dave

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  114. m07 said on December 16th, 2007 at 5:58 am

    hahaha.rolling hahhaha on hahah the florr i ha am ha.nice hahahaha post.

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  115. quest said on December 17th, 2007 at 4:38 am

    lol .. No.1 was the best and sorry for No. 9

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  116. EnergyThis.com said on December 21st, 2007 at 9:04 am

    Hillariously creative… Wow. I like St. Mary’s and the gas station.

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  117. Adam B-The Most Good Looking Guy On The Net (If you have Myopia) said on December 22nd, 2007 at 1:21 am

    St. Marry’s Bar & Grill -
    1. I just wet myself laughing.
    2. I’d LOVE to see this…of course dress standards would apply for customers…they have to dress like vicars/popes/priests etc. and they take it in turns for lap dances from the catholic school girls/nuns…

    Hail Mary and god bless you Jeremy Shoemaker.

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  118. softmanya said on December 24th, 2007 at 1:51 pm

    i think first one is really good. you should try it.

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  119. Webmaster Forum said on December 27th, 2007 at 9:00 am

    last one made me laught :p

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  120. Steve! said on December 28th, 2007 at 10:33 am

    I read this post again. I love it!

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  121. Karn Patel said on December 30th, 2007 at 5:06 pm

    Number 1 was really weird but I (sadly) would pay if you actually did it. That would be freakin awesome.

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  122. SatishSays.com said on January 4th, 2008 at 11:14 am

    Get the petrol by the boot!!
    Muhahaha!

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  123. Kristi @ Addicted2Decor said on January 6th, 2008 at 11:11 am

    This is encouraging. Sometimes we “little people” don’t realize the things that really successful people went through to be successful. I like Benamin Franklin’s quote, “I didn’t fail the test, I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.”

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  124. Glowicki {roBlogger said on January 10th, 2008 at 8:46 pm

    That would be awesome!

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  125. McBilly Wilford said on January 11th, 2008 at 9:17 pm

    Haha. Yeah. Seriously, I LOLed hard on the last one. It would have been a real cool show. A lot of those kind of shows kinda click especially with all the weird shows popping around these days.

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  126. McBilly Wilford said on January 11th, 2008 at 9:18 pm

    The possibilities for disaster makes it the more interesting as a show. Just think of all the bloopers you could get.

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  127. Sarah said on January 13th, 2008 at 4:08 am

    I would’ve thought the text dating thing woul